The Fourth Personal Sojourn of Beelzebub on the Planet Earth

“And indeed, my boy, when during the period of my last personal stay on the planet Earth, I chanced during my travels to meet with the said various independent species of apes, and when, by a habit which has become second nature, I also observed them, I constated very definitely that the whole of the inner functioning and what are called the ‘automatic posture’ of each separate species of these contemporary apes there are exactly like those present in the whole of the presences of some normally arisen quadruped being there, and that even what are called their ‘facial features’ very definitely resemble those of the said quadrupeds; but on the other hand that what are called the ‘psychic features’ of all the separate species of these apes there are absolutely identical, even down to details, with those of the psyche of the three-brained beings there of the ‘female sex.’ ”

At this point of his tales, Beelzebub made a long pause and looking at his favorite Hassein with a smile which very clearly expressed a double meaning, he, continuing to smile, said:

“In the text of the etherogram which I have just received, it is further said that in order this time finally to settle who has descended from whom—whether they from the apes or the apes from them—these freaks, your favorites, have even decided to carry out ‘scientific experiments,’ and furthermore that several of them have already left for the continent of Africa where many of these apes breed, with the object of bringing back from there the number required for these ‘scientific investigations’ of theirs.

“To judge by this etherogram, the beings of the planet Earth who have taken your fancy are again, in their turn, up to their ‘extraordinary tricks.’

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